Believers Pray, Acts 4:23-31

Just Pray It

My BFF is currently undergoing chemo for lymphoma. She has people praying for her all over the world. The whole experience is terrifying and chaotic. It makes me think that there is a lot riding on our prayers. She is a person who needs to be in this world. Lots of people need her, and this world is better because she's in it.

I feel a lot of pressure to pray just right. I want my prayers to be earnest. Intentional. Heart-felt. Effective. Powerful. There's a little part of me that's afraid if I don't pray right, God might not answer. My head knows that's not how God works, but my heart is still afraid. I try to remind myself God doesn't really care how I pray. God doesn't respond only when prayers are perfect. God receives every single prayer ever uttered. The long ones and the short ones. The heart-felt ones and the quickly sputtered ones. The quiet, still ones, and the on-the-run ones. So I'll just pray. And I'll let God take it from here.

Narrative Lectionary Text: Acts 4:23-31

After they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them. When they heard it, they raised their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth, the sea, and everything in them, it is you who said by the Holy Spirit through our ancestor David, your servant:

‘Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples imagine vain things?The kings of the earth took their stand, and the rulers have gathered together against the Lord and against his Messiah.’

For in this city, in fact, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. And now, Lord, look at their threats, and grant to your servants to speak your word with all boldness, while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” When they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with boldness.